


The crucible gave me you

by Sip_of_your_soul, Sourcherrymagiks



Series: Your Ex Lover is Dead [8]
Category: Carry On Series - Rainbow Rowell
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Flower Shop, Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Blow Jobs, Carry On Big Bang, Established Relationship, Explicit Sexual Content, First Kiss, First Time, Idiots in Love, Love, Love at First Sight, M/M, Magic, Post-Book 2: Wayward Son, Rimming, Watford Eighth Year, cuddlesmut, just a sickeningly sweet amount of love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-19
Updated: 2020-08-19
Packaged: 2021-03-06 07:07:07
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 14,617
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25989442
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sip_of_your_soul/pseuds/Sip_of_your_soul, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sourcherrymagiks/pseuds/Sourcherrymagiks
Summary: It's raining in Watford. Everything would just be easier if magic wasn't banned. Except at Crucible Flowers they don't seem to have received the memo.It's all magic, all the time over there.
Relationships: Ebeneza "Ebb" Petty & Simon Snow, Tyrannus Basilton "Baz" Pitch/Simon Snow
Series: Your Ex Lover is Dead [8]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1593220
Comments: 76
Kudos: 139
Collections: Carry On Big Bang 2020





	1. December 20th 2018 - Crucible Flower Shop, Moat Terrace, Watford.

**Author's Note:**

> This is a collaboration between sourcherrymagiks and Sip_of_your_soul for the Big Bang 2020.
> 
> Thanks for the huge heroic act of beta'ing this monster go to [Sconelover](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sconelover/pseuds/sconelover) [NineMagicks](https://archiveofourown.org/users/NineMagicks/pseuds/NineMagicks) [Visinata](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Visinata/pseuds/Visinata)

**Simon**

I wake up to the sound of the rain hammering down. The sunlight is filling my room like it wants to spite the clouds. The room smells of syrup and cinnamon and I’m a tiny bit shimmery; it’s all over the surface of my skin. I look like that Twilight Vampire dude. (Well, probably not as fit.) I’m boiling hot (more than usual) so I’ve steamed up the windows of my room.

It hasn’t been long enough since the last time this happened. A week? If that?

The knock on the door comes just as I’m trying to motivate myself to sort this fucking _situation_ out.

“Si?” Her voice is rough and a little bit sleepy sounding.

“Morning Ebb, I’ll be down now.”

“Please do, Simon. You’re leaking magic everywhere, it’s too early to be slurring my words, love.”

I pull on a hoodie and trackies and run down the stairs from my little attic, bouncing off the walls on the way. When I get to the shop floor I stop for a second to take a deep breath. I will never get over the smell of the shop in the morning, just as the flowers wake up.

And honestly what’s the point in anything if you can’t stop and appreciate the everyday magic?

I duck into the back of the shop, through the tiny kitchen and then out into the garden.

The rain feels bloody amazing on my skin; I can almost hear it sizzle as it hits me. Ebb is bending over the empty flower beds, idly picking the leaves and branches off the bare earth. She’s wearing a hilariously gross plastic rain mac with maypole dancing goats on it. She clicks her tongue at me when I laugh.

“Stop your cheek Simon or I’ll leave you out for the goblins. Are you ready?”

“When you are,” I say, taking her hand. I need her to anchor me here. It doesn’t work otherwise; I lose focus and control and then everything goes to fuck. She gives me a squeeze and a smile that calms me right down.

I bury my fingers in the dark, cool soil and _push_. Time slows for me; everything goes still and quiet. I let the magic trickle out of me, down my arm, into the ground. But more than that....I let it slip back into the air, back into the gaps between everything, back to where it comes from.

It’s happier out of me.

It’s always cross and violent when I’m holding it.

The earth in the flower beds begins to shiver; it starts to look like water or like those documentaries about liqui… something, in earthquakes anyway. Where the ground goes all wobbly.

I love this bit. I give Ebb a big grin.

When the first flowers push up through the dirt I feel like I can breathe again. So many flowers today. Roses and lilies and orchids and freesia and tulips and daffodils and sunflowers. It’s a riot of colour and scent. Red against yellow against pink against white against violet against blue. I laugh. I always laugh when it happens. It’s ridiculous and wonderful and funny.

Ebb is grinning at me too. I know she loves this as much as me. And it’s not just because it’s how we make enough money to live (although it does and it’s bloody helpful in this economy) but because it’s fucking fantastical. I mean, look at it. There must be sixty colours on the flowerbed that was black-brown five minutes ago. This drab little corner of a nothing little town becomes a botanical dream twice a month. Well, it used to be twice a month. Now it’s more like three times. Sometimes four.

I’m getting more powerful or something, and that cannot be good. Ebb thinks the only reason we’ve escaped some sort of magical payback to this point is because I put it all back. Back into the ground. Back into the system. I never keep it and I wouldn’t know how.

It doesn’t quite fit in me.

Before Ebb fostered me I used to wear it off by hitting out or blowing up (which makes you fairly unpopular in the care system, let me tell you) but I’ve been with her for ten years now and this method she found works just fine. It keeps us off the radar of those nutter magicians and the dark creatures and, bonus, I don’t explode stuff.

She ruffles my hair and then potters into the kitchen through the back door to get the tea. I love it when days start like this. Tea and scones under the awning in the garden while the flowers I called up (spelled up? Magicked up? Wizarded up?) set the whole yard aglow. I walk around the flower bed cataloguing what we’ve got, working out how I’ll put them together.

Those cream roses will look beautiful with the lavender, lilacs and tulips. The roses smell too, heavy and sweet. That doesn’t always happen. The rain and the flowers and the magic. Perfect.

There are a few too many flowers today though. Ebb will find another store to buy them before they pass their best. There’s a mix of colours but so many yellow ones this time. Yellow isn’t always popular but it’s my favorite. These look like sunbeams caught on branches. They make me grin again.

It’s going to be a long day once tea and scones are shared. So we don’t rush. I’m happy to wait until Ebb has finished telling stories of a world where magic was taught and controlled and loved. A school where kids just did magic.

In the open.

Fearlessly.

I’m not jealous exactly, but I do feel a funny sort of homesickness when she talks like this. Like a bit of me will never quite be right. I suppose everyone with magic now must feel the same, and at least I can use mine.

Ebb says that most people need spells to control their magic; that’s why they had to go to special magic school. To learn about how to put the words together in the right way to make things happen.

Sounds like a massive faff to me.

But it is fascinating. I love reading the books she ‘liberated’ when they closed the school down. I probably know more than most magicians my age about the old ways. Because it’s not allowed now, the books and the spells and stuff—there was a terrible attack, you see. The headmistress died defending the nursery from vampires. After that the Coven (the ones in charge) banned the use of spells and magic to protect the World of Mages. The dark creatures don’t attack anymore because they don’t feel threatened. That’s the theory, anyway.

But it’s not right, is it? Not being able to use magic if you’ve got it? The only reason I can is because I don’t need spells, and only spells can be detected. Then controlled. I hate that the world is like that. It’s horrible stuff.

Ebb doesn’t seem to mind much though. I think she misses the school and the headmistress but I keep her pretty busy.

The garden takes up all my attention through the morning. I’m soaked to the skin but I take my time moving flowers around into the poly tunnel and greenhouse, gathering all the ones destined for the shop, boxing up those we will sell on. I don’t even notice it’s lunchtime until Ebb forces a ham sandwich into my hand.

Then it’s on to fixing up the displays in the shop, tying some bouquets, filling in the orders. It’s been raining non-stop but there has been a steady stream of customers, so I hardly notice when the door opens five minutes before closing.

Until I do.

**Baz**

It is unreasonably cold. Even for December. I need to get home and put the kettle on immediately, then huddle my chilled bones around my smelly electric heater. Unfortunately Daphne is due to visit tomorrow (bimonthly welfare check to ensure I haven’t eaten any orphans, I assume) and I absolutely cannot host her without flowers. This slush will ruin my shoes and my hair must be a goddamned fright.

It’s just uncivilised to have to do these things without.....well. For oneself.

I turn the corner to a dirty, grey street that I’ve never been to before. I’ve been assured the flower shop here will have the yellow roses that Daphne prefers, and if not then I’m completely out of options. She’ll simply have to settle for white.

I catch sight of the shop just as a car drives entirely too close to the kerb and splashes muddy water up my leg. I resist the urge to spell them stupid.

It’s still my first instinct to reach for a wand that isn’t there.

To do magic that isn’t allowed.

To let the fire inside burn a little.

It isn’t worth it though. If anyone was to report me it would reflect badly on my parents. I refuse to think about whatever barbaric punishments they use to restrict magic in people who cannot behave as expected.

I’ve heard the reasons over and over again. We are all safer apparently, and I should be the most relieved. After all, it was magic that killed my mother and nearly killed me. Magic that drew the dark creatures to attack us time after time. Now that we don’t use magic there is no reason for them to attack again.

Everyone is safer.

We just all feel like shit all of the time.

I shake my head to clear it of these altogether heretical thoughts and get back on task. Flowers. I cross over to the little shop which is twee beyond all reason. The outside is illuminated with incandescent light bulbs under a canopy of green stripes. It’s sickeningly endearing.

It also reeks of magic, more magic than I’ve ever felt in one place before. Even more than the club when everyone is relaxed enough to let go a little.

Wading through the slush and cinnamon magic, I finally open the door into the tiny shop. Depressingly, it is equally kitsch inside. Everything is ramshackle but functional. It’s warm, so warm and it smells of everything good. It only takes a cursory glance to find what I’m looking for. They are huge and so vivid. I wonder for a minute if they might be a bit much for Daphne; they look too rich, too strong, too fiery in their beauty, like bursts of sunshine.

I look towards the counter to see if anyone’s around to help.

And freeze.

The pull starts just below my navel. At first it’s a gentle tug but soon it’s insistent, painful. It’s dragging me towards the very spot I’m trying to avoid.

Crowley, he is fucking gorgeous. The roses pale into nothing next him. He’s all bronze curls and freckled skin, big blue eyes and a smile that lights up everything. _He_ looks like sunshine.

Of course I want to go right up to him, run my hands through his ridiculous curls, pull him into me so I can kiss his mouth. I want to eat him. I just want him.

I don’t apparently have much choice. I try to lean back but the pain makes my eyes water. Very reluctantly (well, I’d like the option) I step closer.

**Simon**

I would have moved towards him anyway, I mean, who fucking wouldn’t? But the pulling out my intestines thing makes it less optional. I cross the shop in a few steps and I know deep inside me that I’m supposed to hold his hand (shake it?) but that’s not what I want to do. Not at all.

**Baz**

He doesn’t seem to hesitate for a moment, just steps to me. Right in my space, unbelievably close. At this distance he’s all butter and vanilla; I can’t even smell the flowers anymore. I think about stepping back and realise I emphatically do not want to do that.

He’s so warm.

His hand is on my waist, pulling me right into him.

My hand is in his hair, the other on his wrist. What the fuck is going on?

Then the kissing starts.

**Simon**

Kissing him feels like the answer.

It feels like a heartbeat.

It feels like shaking apart and back together like a tide.

**Baz**

I’m kissing a complete stranger.

He’s kissing me.

More than kissing.

He’s pushing his whole body against me fairly hard and my body is just pushing back.

All at once I’m full of something else, something deep and powerful and.......

**Simon**

I don’t do it on purpose. I don’t think any of this is on purpose, but the magic is definitely not. It’s supposed to be a secret and here I am spilling it into a stranger.

It feels so good though.

I look him in the eyes and see such a hunger there. He nods at me and I breathe the magic out into him and feel something prickle under my skin.

**Baz**

His eyes. The concern on his face. His beautiful magic, fresh and clean like mountain water. I pull him back into another kiss, feel his tongue slide along mine.

Everything about him is warm except his mouth.

His mouth is hot.

He’s making my mouth hot.

He’s making my magic hot.

When he exhales my magic slips into him and twines around his briefly, before surging forward.

The lights in the shop flicker and I come to my senses almost immediately.

“Stop, they’ll come.” I’m panicking as I say it but he doesn’t seem to care.

He looks drugged, bewildered, gorgeous.

“Sorry, I, it’s just,” he says, and I feel his magic as it slips out of me, it’s not painful but it leaves an ache.

Then he kisses me again and I forget all about it.

**Simon**

I should stop kissing him.

I should probably ask him his name.

I should offer him tea.

I should ask him about magic.

I do stop kissing him.

I take his hand and pull him after me through the door at the back of the shop that leads to the stairs. I think he’s going to say something or pull away but he just follows where I lead.

“Ebb, I’m busy!” I shout behind me, and hear a grunt of acknowledgement that frees up my last concern. I need him. I need him now and I don’t even care about the why.

**Baz**

I have no fucking idea what I’m doing.

It’s surely a recipe for utter disaster. It feels amazing though; it feels like letting go.

Unless he’s got a secret magic library up here I’m guessing what happens next.

This is insane.

I never do this.

I have no idea what I’m doing.

**Simon**

He’s following behind me and I’m suddenly really aware of what a clumsy lout I am compared to him. He even glides up the stairs. I resist the urge to call him a prat and knock him off balance.

I’ve known him for five minutes and I’m already dying to torment him. Really torment him.

I don’t do this.

I’ve never done this.

I don't know what I’m doing.

**Baz**

He opens the door (barges it really, is there any wall or door that is safe from those shoulders?) into a magical library.

Oh.

Maybe I’ve misread this.

Then he slams me against the wall and kisses me breathless again. My magic is desperate for him, it’s pushing up, coursing through me. It’s a terrible idea to let it out though. Not until we know what’s going on.

My hands have found their way under his damp hoodie and I wholeheartedly approve of their initiative. His skin is hot to the touch, smooth as butter and soft. So soft. When I press my fingertips harder, trying to pull him closer, impossibly closer, I feel his muscles just under the surface. It’s too much. It forces out a moan straight into his mouth. Which is mortifying. This whole thing is mortifying.

I drown the shame in his kisses.

I forget that shame even exists when he moves his kisses down to my neck.

Instead of worrying about, well, anything, I lean even further into him and whisper his name.

“Simon, please.”

His head snaps up and I meet his eyes, as surprised as he is.

“How do you know my name? Did I tell you?” There is an edge of panic in his voice; there is an edge of panic in me.

“I didn’t know that I did. I don’t think you told me, I just knew. I don’t know what’s going on here.” I sound like an idiot.

He strokes my hair back off my face and I instinctively turn my face into his palm.

“I don’t either but I could take a wild stab in the dark and say it’s magic.” He says it like it is a perfectly appropriate matter for conversation.

I’m about to shush him or panic or run away, but then I realise that saying the word is no more dangerous than the magic that’s already here. Than the piles of books around us.

“What are these?” I ask, pointing to the precarious stack closest to us. There are books everywhere. On bookcases, stacked on the floor, dangerously heaped on the tiny bedside table. The only place free of books is the bed.

Crowley.

The bed.

I forget how to breathe for a minute.

He leans back into me for a second and then pulls me over to the largest bookcase.

Why is he always pulling me?

Why am I always letting him?

Why the infernal fuck am I smiling?

He hands me a leather bound copy of Fillick’s ‘Guide to Magical Nouns’. It’s in excellent condition, decked edges, some minor foxing but it’s clearly been loved.

“Watford Library. Ebb took what she could when she left but she doesn’t like them too close. Said she never liked them much when she was there.” He’s speaking as if discussing Watford is fine rather than practically heretical.

“Shush Simon, you can’t just say things like that, to me, I mean, at all.”

"I think I can and I think you can say those things to me. We’re safe here. It’s safe." He takes the book and replaces it on the shelf. Then he turns back to me and puts his hands on my waist.

"I want to talk about all this with you and I want you to tell me everything you know, but first." His eyes flick to my mouth and I don’t wait for him to finish before I’m wrapping myself back around him.

**Simon**

There is some cool stuff going on here I think. Magic stuff. Big magic stuff. And I need to know everything. I need to know why I can’t talk about Watford and why this boy looked so haunted when I mentioned it. But first things first. I need to kiss him.

His hands are under my damp top again, tracing cool stripes up and down my back. I lift my arms and he takes it off for me like we’ve undressed each other a million times before.

His breath hitches as he looks at me and I feel all hot and squirmy inside. It’s hard to be looked at like that; there’s too much in that look.

I divert him by pushing his coat off his shoulders. It thuds to the floor in a damp pile. He is slimmer than he looked when he was buried under all that expensive wool. Slimmer but still powerful. I run my hands down the front of his shirt and we both watch the progress of my hands, transfixed. My great big, rough, dirty paws look weird against his expensive shirt but I reckon it’s a problem I can solve. I pull the buttons undone, dragging it untucked with a yank. It takes ages and about a minute to get him out of it.

I stare at him with my mouth wide open like a fool. Then I decide to put my mouth to better use. He makes a lovely noise when I swirl my tongue over his nipple. Then he puts one hand on my shoulder and tugs lightly at my hair with the other. I don’t need much more encouragement than that. I suck and nip at the sensitive flesh until his knees start to buckle.

I lift him easily and carry him to the bed. We’re both laughing between kisses and kissing between laughter because this is too much, it’s too good.

Is love supposed to be like this? Is this love? It feels like it, but it can’t be, can it? Can it?

I make an executive decision to stop thinking about it and take his trousers off instead. He starts fumbling at mine too and it’s a disaster. With the kissing and the fumbling and the laughing it feels so familiar.

Even when I slap his hand away for tugging too hard at my belt and call him a prat.

Even when I nip his lip and he calls me a menace.

Even when I finally press up against him, skin to skin.

Even when I work my fingers inside him and he whines my name.

Even when he grabs my hair and arches into me.

Even when I’m finally, finally inside him.

Even when we move together like we’ve done it a million times but like it’s all new at the same time.

Even when my heart is going to explode.


	2. December 20th 2015, 10pm, Watford School of Magicks, Watford

**Baz**

“I’m done with you today,” I say. “I’ve been struck by lightning twice in the last twelve hours, and now I’m just done.”

"Well I’m not done. Why won’t you let me in? Why won’t you stop being such an arse?”

I mean to roll away from him. I want to make him shut up. Instead, I do the least sensible thing I could possibly do. 

I stand up and take a step into his space. 

“Because,” I spit.

“Because what?” He’s right there, fists clenched, jaw out, facing me down, fearless, breathless.

I just stare at him.

What am I supposed to say? _I can’t let you in because I love you? I can’t let you in because I’m supposed to kill you? I can’t let you in because I don’t deserve you?_

Then the little fucker kisses me. 

**Simon**

I’m so fucking done with his shit. 

I’m so done with pretending that we are what? Enemies? Rivals? Allies? 

Fuck all of that.

What I know now is that when you can share magic you share feelings. 

So there is no going back.

Like we can pretend I don’t know exactly what’s going on in his thick head. 

His mouth is cold and I want to warm it up. I want to warm _him_ up. I push gently and he sits back down on the bed. I follow and climb into his lap. 

I can’t stop kissing him. 

I don’t want to stop kissing him.

From the way he’s tugging me down into him, I think he might feel the same way. 

Merlin, he is so fucking sexy. It took me a moment to work it out. (Well it’s taken me years but, you know.) But now I’m where I’m meant to be.

Now I’m almost as close as I can be. My hands are all over him. My heartbeat is pounding in my ears. 

**Baz**

What the ever loving fuck is going on in my life? 

How is Simon Snow kissing me? Why is he kissing me? Has the magic sharing finally addled his last brain cell? Did the dragon knock all sense out of him? 

I moan into his mouth as he runs his hand through my hair and cradles the back of my head in his sweaty palm. 

I pull him in closer and my fingertips find their way just below his waistband. How? 

Surely he’s going to kill me for this any moment now. 

I brace for death when he pushes against me and then relax when I realise what he’s doing. He wants us to lie down. He wants to lie on top of me, slotted between my legs. He wants to kiss me into the bed. Maybe even into oblivion. 

I can make my peace with that. 

**Simon**

I want to press all of me into all of him. I want to kiss him until I can’t breathe. (That might be sooner than I’d like, I’m already panting.) I want him.

I pull back a bit because I should say something really. Even I know that it’s shit manners to just plonk yourself in your arch-enemies lap and kiss them stupid. 

It doesn’t work though because he just chases my mouth until we’re at it again. 

I suppose I don’t need to apologise right now then. 

Our hands were everywhere, all over, but at some point he just held my hand in his and I didn’t move it. It feels safe. This whole thing feels safe, here in our room, away from the insanity out there. 

**Baz**

We had to stop kissing just before sunrise. I can’t really feel my mouth anymore. If I wasn’t a vampire I think he might have crushed me hours ago. He’s tucked under my arm now, leg slung over my waist, hand holding tightly to mine. 

I could stop now, cease to exist entirely, and it would have all been worth it.

I wouldn’t say no to more but I’m trying to keep my expectations this side of realistic. 

“Baz?” he asks in a dozy voice.

“Snow?” I snark back.

“Could you feel what I felt when we, with the magic?”

I was not expecting that. Is that where this all came from? The horror and shame and mortification sweep through me. 

“Not really, Snow. Obviously you are stuffed full of disgusting feelings and they all bled into one mass of righteousness do-goodery.” I was aiming for mean but I think I might have eased into bitterness by the end. He snorts at me. 

“You’re a fine one to talk, Pitch, soft as a kitten you are.” He kisses my jaw fondly as he says it. 

Great. Absolutely wonderful. Exactly the thing to make my miserable existence even more of an adventure in agony. Simon bloody Snow knowing all of my feelings.

“Anyway, I just wanted to know if you knew how I felt about you. I thought it might be easier than trying to figure it out. I mean, I want this. This is, well, it’s nice innit?” He looks so earnest as he delivers this confusing little speech that I’m torn between ripping his throat out or snogging him until he forgets words. All words. 

“I’m not helping you cheat on your homework, Simon. Work your own feelings out.” I try to push him off me but he just clings tighter.

“You called me Simon.” He looks so unbearably smug that I bring his hand to my mouth and kiss all of his fingers. 

**Simon**

He’s trying to distract me and doing an excellent job of it. I did really want to know if he knew how I felt. I never know how I feel properly. 

I do know I want to feel him. 

I do know that when he kisses me like that everything else can fuck off, so I suppose that will do for now. 

I go back to kissing him. It’s the only thing that really makes sense. He’s not letting go of my hand so I use it to pin both his hands over his head. 

He raises his insufferable bloody eyebrow at me so I bite his lip. Then there is kissing. Blinding, beautiful kissing. 

Everytime I breathe he somehow moves closer into my space (what space though?) until the edges start to become a bit blurry. I feel like I’m sinking into him, like he’s drifting into me. 

I want that, I think.

I want him. 

All of him. 

All of his annoying villainy and all those feelings he’s hiding. 

I want them. 

“Baz, I do, you know.” I haven’t moved back enough so my lips drag against his when I speak. It’s too horrible not to kiss him. I settle for sucking his top lip briefly. I’ve made such a mess of his mouth. I’ve done that. 

“What?” 

“Want this.”

He snorts and turns his head a bit. I’ve still got his hands and I’m not letting him go until he understands. 

“Oi, prat, I want you. I want you with me. Us. If you don’t then you better give a good reason mate, because that’s not what it felt like. Don’t give me politics either. Don’t care.”

“How can I not give you politics, Snow? It is political. We can’t.” He still won’t look at me. I’m looking at him though. I’m never stopping. 

“You are dead lovely, you know. And fuck politics. We’re together, yeah?” I nudge my hip into the inside of his thigh and hold down the noise I want to make. 

This is fucking madness. 

“How? How, Snow?” His voice is a bit shaky so I roll my hip again and this time I moan into his neck. 

“Baz, please, say yes for fucks sake. I need you.”

My voice is embarrassing. I’ve gone all whispery. 

**Baz**

I cannot believe this fucking nightmare of a chaos demon is grinding on me and begging me to agree to what? A relationship? A fuck? Do I even really care which?

“Snow, be reasonable please. We cannot do this, it would cause mayhem.” I try to pull my hands loose but not really.

“Don’t care. Do you want to be with me?” he demands.

I start to talk and he shakes his head so his ridiculous curls bounce and catch the sunshine. He speaks again.

“DO. YOU. WANT. ME?”

And I can’t anymore. Because of course I do. And he’s Simon Bloody Snow; he will get what he wants in the end anyway. 

I’m what he wants. I’m what he wants. I’m what he wants. 

“Yes.”

“Yes?”

“Yes, you absolute knob, you bloody catastrophe, yes.” I manage to finish the sentence with half a breath before he drowns me in kisses again.

I feel the magic before the tightness in my wrist. I pull against his hand but it’s stuck. I resist the urge to blame him because it doesn’t feel like his magic at all. It’s far too refined, crystal clear and precise. 

His beautiful face lights up with a smile when he looks at our hands. He still loves magic more than anyone else I know. It's still, well, _magic_ to him. 

He brings our hands down so I can see too. There are tiny little green vines binding us, plaited from elbow to fingertip. Miniature six petal flowers in shades of yellow and blue almost cover the leaves. 

He bumps my cheek with his nose. 

"Good job you said ‘yes’, looks like you would have had to anyway." He’s grinning as he says it. He hasn’t stopped grinning. 

"I think it’s _because_ I said ‘yes,’ you blundering pillock. Not everything is just about you, Snow." Even as I’m saying it I know that it’s all coming out more grudgingly fond than sharp and he bumps me again, then lays a kiss on my cheek. 

Somewhere in the back of my brain I know what this is. The knowledge is right there, just out of reach. 

Then he’s kissing me again and I can’t bloody think anymore anyway. 


	3. 20th December 2021, 10pm. Outside Griffon Studio Postgrad Residences, Winstanley Road, Battersea, London.

**Baz**

“J-j-j-just fuck off, y-y-you’ve done enou—” he gives up before he gets to the end of the sentence. 

I deserve it. 

I deserve it all. 

I don’t have a chance to respond (what would I say anyway?) before he _explodes_ away from me.

Straight into the fucking road. 

I grab his sleeve just in time. (I’m always on the verge of trying to touch him; it’s nice to have a non-creepy reason.)

But because this is my fucking nightmare of a life I can’t just get him out of the way of the car. Not even the slightest possibility of a neutral result. Instead I yank him out of the way of imminent death but straight into my arms.

Into my fucking arms. 

I can hardly hold him up, what with us both off balance, so we end up in a panting tangle against the nearest wall. 

He braces his arm on the brick behind my shoulder which brings him so perilously close. His stupid, muscular thigh is between my legs. (That is more than enough to make me dizzy with lust.) 

I wish that was the worst of it.

**Simon**

I just wanted him to shut up. 

I wanted him to back off and give me a minute to think.

Now I’m not exactly getting the room to think, but he _has_ shut up. So I sort of succeeded.

I should shove myself away and storm off again. Before he opens his bloody mouth and I have to. But. Well. There’s a bit of a problem with that plan. I would have to shove myself away from him and I just don’t want to. 

I want to melt a bit. 

I want him to keep his hand on my lower back. 

I want him to keep looking at me like he is. 

Like I’m something other than a really inconvenient pain in his arse.

He’s really beautiful. I dunno if I’ve thought about how beautiful he is before. He’s got these really long eyelashes and these swirly grey eyes. His eyes. They look like a winter sky. 

What the fuck is wrong with me? 

I really should push away. 

I want to touch the hair that’s drifted down over his face, tuck it back behind his ear. Or maybe just run my fingers through it a bit. Actually I think I’d like to muss his hair up good and proper. He looks so much better when he’s a bit of a mess. 

He’s a bit of a mess now. His breathing is still a bit deeper than usual from dragging me out of the road. I’m not a small bloke so that’s no easy feat. I can feel how strong he is though, now I’m this close to him. 

He’s hard everywhere I’m touching him. I don’t mean. Oh God. Why would I go there? 

What is happening to me?

**Baz**

I’m waiting for him to storm off again.

Hopefully in a safer and more considerate fashion. 

Certainly a less deadly fashion. 

But instead of that he’s looking up at me, his eyes darting all over my face. I wonder if there’s food on my cheek. (He usually saves those looks for things he’s about to devour.) 

I could dissolve into an actual panic or just dissolve in general but he’s holding me up on his thigh and with his hand on my waist. 

His hand on my waist. 

Still. 

I’m still holding him. 

He’s so warm and so very close. I press my hand into his back a little more. His t-shirt has slightly hitched up under my fingertips and I’m touching his skin. I’m touching Simon Salisbury’s skin. 

He’s letting me. 

His face is closer; I swear it’s closer than it was. I can taste his breath in my mouth. My hand is moving up his back all by itself and he is going to throw me in the road but I just don’t care. 

He shifts slightly and I brace for something to happen. Something not good. Except it doesn’t. 

He must have tripped right? 

But if he tripped why is he kissing me?

Why is he moaning tiny satisfied moans into my mouth?

You don’t accidentally trip into snogging someone do you? 

I kiss him back as desperately as I’ve wanted to for weeks now. As desperately as I need to.

**Simon**

It’s the right decision. 

This is definitely what I wanted. Might have been nice of my brain to let me know but you can’t have everything. It’s good. It’s more than good. I pull back and roll the words over and over before I whisper in his ear, “My place?” He looks uncertain, like I’m tricking him or plotting or something. 

“P-p-please Baz, I want you.” The words seem to work some kind of magic on him because we are moving back towards my dorm at a speed which doesn’t feel real. 

He’s holding my hand so tightly, pulling me and tugging at me. I don’t think even I could be stupid enough to misread these signs. I can hardly get the key in the lock because he’s kissing my neck and running his hands over my stomach and _fuuucccckkk_ I need this now. 

We fall in through the door into a heap on the floor and I’m done waiting. I kick the door shut from where I’m laying and start ripping at his clothes. 

We’re both all thumbs and elbows. 

The fabric between us is making a range of noises that all sound like protests. I want his skin in my mouth and I’ll destroy anything to get to it.

I laugh with delight when I finally get my hands on his chest. Fuck me, he’s fit. He looks like a model from one of those fitness magazines but in real life. All caramel skin and abs. 

“Gorgeous,” I manage to squeeze out without stammering at all. 

“Not too shabby yourself,” he huffs into my neck as his hands roam all over my naked skin. 

“Are we going to fuck on the floor of your room, Simon?” he asks with a raised eyebrow, and I feel the familiar pull of wanting to smack him in the face mixed with this new sensation of wanting him to ride me until I’m screaming. 

That sensation might not be so new, now that I come to think of it. I might have been waking to that thought for weeks. Shit. 

I take as deep a breath as I can considering the mauling he’s giving me and blurt out, “Yes, Yes we f-f-fucking are because I n-n-need you now.”

**Baz**

My brain feels like an addled monkey took charge because I think Simon Salisbury just told me that he wants me too much to make it the nine steps to the bed. 

I think he said he _needed_. I’m sure he said it completely clearly. 

“Have you got?” I say stupidly while I’m trying to yank his jeans down. 

He lifts his hips to help me out and drags his bag over with his free arm. 

Right. 

It’s another round of wrestling and laughing as we both try to take each other’s trousers off without stopping the kiss or allowing any space between us. 

When he laughs into my mouth I could, quite literally, die.

I’ve wanted this for so long. I want him so badly and more than that, I like him. I like how even this is fun and an adventure and incredible all at the same time. 

“Baz, fuck, I, why is this so good?”

Like I’ve got an answer that could do anything but put him off. 

“I really like you, have for a while.” I gasp a bit at the end because he’s moved his ridiculously big hand and wrapped it around my cock. I have to concentrate really hard not to fuck into it as hard as I want to. 

“I have too. I think, more maybe, I think I might...”

It’s the most I’ve ever heard him talk in one go that clearly (without reading off something). I want to know what he _might._ What _might_ he? 

But he’s flipping me onto my back and nudging my knees apart so I forget to ask. He plants a kiss just above the line of my pants and then drags them down my legs. Kissing along the inside of my thigh as he does it. He’s rough and desperate and it’s making me feral. 

“Simon, you need to get something inside me soon, please.”

He grins at me with such smug pride that I want to pin him down and lick him. I settle for stroking my cock. He scrambles for the lube and pushes my knees apart. 

Finally.

**Simon**

I’ve done this a couple of times before but it’s never felt like this. I’m not as nervous as I should be; I’m not nervous at all. 

Everything about him feels familiar and comforting and annoying. Like that night on the sofa when it felt like we had known each other forever. I can’t take my time though or I’m just going to end up rutting into him. 

I can barely look at him as it is, all mussed up on the floor of my flat, wide open for me.

I use far too much lube and it’s far too cold. He winces at me when it touches him. When I touch him. Oh my god. He’s going to let me put my fingers in him. 

“Now Simon, for fuck’s sake.” He hisses it at me and it wakes me right up. 

I circle his hole again and again before I slide my finger in. I’m trying not to short out again because the tightness of him and the way his breath is catching and the fucking loveliness of him is just a bit much. 

"M-mmore?” 

He lets me finish my stammer mess of a question before he answers and it makes my heart swell up a bit. That patience must have been painful if he is half as riled up as me. “Yes, Simon, yes.”

I add another finger but that’s all I need to do. He’s fucking down onto my hand so hard that I don’t need to move at all. I add a third finger and he pulls himself up (fuck me, the abs on him) to grab my shoulder while he writhes on my fingers. It’s the hottest thing I’ve ever seen. 

He shoves me backwards and kisses me and kisses me. I don’t mean to say it and fuck knows how hard it is for me to say anything so it shouldn’t happen. But here I am, whispering in his mouth. “I love you.”

**Baz**

It’s more than completely unexpected. More unexpectedly, I just believe him. I suppose this could be his sex kink, pretending to love whoever he is fucking, but it sounds real. It feels real. 

I take a chance and whisper it back. 

I think I might die from the flurry of desperate kisses that follow.

I don’t think I’d mind. 

I need more, I’m so hungry for him, for all of him. He steadies me with one arm while he holds his cock in the other. I take him in so slowly, feeling the stretch and the need. We both gasp as I bottom out. 

He’s here in front of me, under me, inside me. He loves me. He wants me. 

I hold his hand so tightly as I rock my hips into him. His other hand rubs circles on my hip and then pulls at me to up the tempo.

I feel like I’m going to explode or melt or maybe evaporate. 

“Baz, I love you, really.” 

“I know, I love you too.” 

It’s so incongruous and ridiculous and fucking hot that I don’t even think it’s strange when a vine starts twining up my arm and binding my hand to his. 

I can’t even really focus on it because he’s about to come apart underneath me and I want to watch him unravel. 

I want to be there with him. 

His hand finds my cock. The strokes are clumsy and awkward but I’m nearly there anyway. 

**Simon**

I can’t even be bothered with whatever the fuck is going on with our hands. Closer is better and tied up doesn’t seem half bad. 

He’s biting his lip now and sweat is running down his chest. I can’t hold on and I don’t want to. 

“I’m gonna come, Baz.”

I’ve barely finished saying the words before I’m shuddering into him. Adding my heat to his. He keeps rocking onto me through each wave that hits until I feel him tensing too, coming all over my hand and stomach. It should just be hot. This should all be lust. It’s not though. 

I pull him down onto me with my one free arm and hold him tight while I kiss him. 

“Stay, stay with me.” 

I should expect him to laugh it off and make a quick escape from me. I am a nutter who just told him I loved him after arguing with him for months.

I am the weirdo who just fucked him on the floor of my room and made it into a whole romantic thing. 

Also, we seem to be tied together with vines.

But I expect exactly what I get.

“Always. You’re mine now.”

He waves our bound hands together, except they aren’t bound anymore. Now it’s much weirder. Matching tattoos up and down our arms, like the echo of the vines that appeared and disappeared. 

I find that I don’t actually give a fuck though. So I kiss him again. 


	4. Artwork

[ ](https://www.flickr.com/photos/186070339@N02/50243312428/in/dateposted-public/)

[](https://www.flickr.com/photos/186070339@N02/50243312423/in/dateposted-public/)


	5. December 20th 2020, 10pm. 6 Lilford Road, Camberwell, London

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> December 20th 2020, 10pm. 6 Lilford Road, Camberwell, London

**Baz**

I understand completely the purpose of this training. I understand that there is very little point having vampire strength if you can’t use it. I clearly see the logic behind this thinking. 

We are now defenders of the magickal realm, so we need all the strength we can muster. 

I understand it very clearly, because Penelope Bunce has drilled it into my brain so persistently that I can hear it in her voice. In my sleep. 

It’s not as if I don’t have any athletic experience or any training to fall back on. But it does seem terribly uncouth to go around fighting. And it doesn’t play to my instincts or advantages. In short, I did not train to become one of the country’s most powerful magicians so I could headbutt my enemies. 

Bunce and Shepard are off on some foolhardy research mission, leaving us with strict instructions to train. So I start off sulky anyway. Then we have a debate about his wings. I maintain they are both a liability and an unfair advantage. He eventually lets me tuck them away nicely but not before threatening to make me pay. 

It doesn’t improve my mood when he follows through on that and throws me about six times in twenty minutes. 

I’m not a bloody punch bag for the Chosen One.

He’s unbelievably quick and strong. I cannot spot what he’s about to do until I get a face full of mat. 

It’s doing horrible things to my hair. 

"Drop your centre of gravity love, you’re off balance long before I push you." He’s trying not to sound smug. 

I play stupid and try not to sigh as he adjusts my stance, running his hands over me to check where I’m holding tension, where I need to loosen up. 

Does he have any idea what he does to me when he’s breathing in my ear like that? Casually putting his hand on my hip? Leaning into my back?

It’s fucking irresistible.

I grab his wrist ready to pull him over my shoulder and throw him but he’s already taken my feet out from under me. He grins as he pins my arms over my head. 

"Amateur." He kisses my cheek.

"Tyrant." I lick his jaw.

"Weakling." He nips at my lip.

"Bully." I wrap my legs around his waist.

I wait for the inevitable blush, the uncomfortable stammer. I wait for him to go back into his protective shell and I wish I had one too.

Instead he kisses me again. 

Then leans into my hips.

Oh.

**Simon**

I know, I know. It’s not acceptable to get turned on because you can beat your boyfriend up. My therapist would have a lot to say about it. Or she’d make _me_ say a lot about it which would be worse. 

But let’s reframe it. (Do you see what I did there?) It is perfectly normal to get turned on by your boyfriend's ridiculously hot body, especially when he’s got his stupid long legs wrapped around you. 

So. I think I’m going to do this now. If I plan a nice dinner and candles and stuff, if I do a whole seduction routine, I’m going to get in my head for the millionth time and miss out for the millionth time and mess Baz around for the millionth time. 

He always says he understands and that he’ll wait but it must be annoying, right? Like more annoying than usual me. 

I’m even annoying myself now.

Fuck it.

I roll my hips into him again. I kiss him harder. 

The way he has his legs wrapped around me means he can’t have missed my meaning. And unless I’m going mental I think he feels the same. 

I grab his arse and pull him even closer to me, properly grinding now. 

“Baz?”

“Can I help you with something there, Snow?” 

He’s got that voice on that makes me go all weak. His posh tosser voice. I’m aching for him even more now. 

Right. I’m going to do this. Just ask for what I want.

Nicely. 

With my best words. 

“Any chance of a blow job?” I say and immediately want to die. That’s the best I could do apparently. Fuck.

“Well, as you asked so beautifully and with such consummate romance.” He’s grinning at me as he says it. The twat. 

But then he’s flipping me over and kissing me into the mat, so I don’t think he minds really. 

He’s kissing my neck, making me melt, pushing up my sweaty t-shirt and grazing my stomach with one finger as he does it. I briefly die of shame because I must stink. Why would I ask him to put his mouth on me now of all times? 

I am a knob. 

“Snow– Simon, are you sure? Say stop if you need me to, please?” He looks so vulnerable as he says it.

I feel so vulnerable.

It makes me pull away inside a bit, it makes me want to back out, but then it makes me sure. 

I nod. 

Then I pull him into a bruising kiss. Our teeth clatter together and I’m sure I’m pulling his hair too hard. But he’s giving it all back to me. It’s clumsy and stupid and desperately hungry, then he pushes up and pulls my shirt up. I can’t look at him for a minute. 

It’s a lot. 

All these messy feelings everywhere. I’m not a fan. 

But he runs his thumbs over my nipples and there is only one feeling. 

**Baz**

He wants this. He asked for it (the romance of it, be still my beating heart). 

For him the asking is beyond difficult.

There are still a million emotions a minute flashing over his face. A permanent blush. That tension in his jaw. I’m going to make it all go away. I’m going to leave him with one barely coherent feeling; just want, nothing else. 

He’s getting there already. 

His chest is tanned and freckled, ripped but still soft. Simon loves carbs too much for a six pack (unless it’s a six pack of scones) but it’s glorious. What you see and what you feel don’t quite match. 

Soft and hard.

Strong and gentle. 

Simon. 

I run my fingers over his nipples and feel him shudder under me. So beautiful. I drag his t-shirt over his head, mussing his curls and filling the air with the smell of him. I’m at his neck again in a second. He tastes of cinnamon and salt, sweat and vanilla. Like an amazing dessert. I suppose I should avoid thinking of him in terms of menu items; it’s a little unbecoming of a vampire. 

“You take it off.” He can hardly get his words out and my instinct is always to make him work for it, but I take my own vest off. He’s biting his fucking lip as he looks me over. He’s seen me before, of course, we’ve been here before. 

But this time he’s looking at me. 

Not away, not down, not with panic. He looks starving. For me. 

He licks his lips and reaches for my hips. I hear a groan and realise that it’s me. 

Crowley. 

**Simon**

Fuck.

Fuck.

Fuck.

My hands have got a plan apparently. I sure as magic haven’t so I just go with it. I watch myself pulling at his joggers without really understanding what is going to happen if I keep it up. 

I get one hand on his arse over his pants while the other keeps pushing the side of the waistband down. I’m pushing and pulling at the same time and it’s not working. Not working fast enough.

“Baz, get these off yeah?” I give his arse a squeeze as I say it.

“Will you do the same?” I can’t bear that he says it uncertainly. Baz shouldn’t have to be unsure. It doesn’t suit him.

It’s a bit of a risk but I say it anyway. “No, you do both.” 

He raises his perfect eyebrow at me then dives at my joggers. The way he savages me out of them is so hot. Like he’s finally been allowed to unwrap a gift he’s been waiting for forever. Which I suppose he has. I don’t have time to be embarrassed (I am a bit embarrassed) because I just want his eyes on me, his hands on me, his mouth on me.

I whimper at him. 

He’s come to a full stop staring at my cock. 

Merlin and Morgana.

He’s staring at my cock.

I shift my hips a bit and whisper his name. 

**Baz**

Fuck.

Simon bloody Snow is naked and practically begging in front of me. 

I can’t move though. 

I’m paralysed by just how gorgeous he is naked. 

His cock is heavy against his stomach and he’s so fucking hard. For me. Because he wants me. 

I’m supposed to be taking my clothes off, but when he squirms I lose that thought completely. 

As if I’m under a spell I run my thumb from the golden thatch of hair at the base of his cock to the leaking tip of it. Then I put my thumb in my mouth. I think I might burst but I’m a second too slow because Simon gets there first. 

Exploding up against me, dragging me close so he can kiss me, scraping his nails down my back, forcing me close, closer. 

I can’t breathe.

I don’t want to. 

I just want him like this. Wild and impulsive and wanting. 

He lets me lay him back down. He laughs at our lack of coordination and I laugh with him. It doesn’t change the mood though. It just sets a whole new fire inside me. 

I push my joggers and pants off as quickly as I possibly can because I need to be touching him, all of him, with all of me. 

**Simon**

He’s driving me fucking nuts. 

It’s never been so hard to lie still. Well I’m not really lying still, I’m squirming a bit. I think I’m starting to realise how much I want; I want more than I’ve asked for. I didn’t know if I would. I’ve never been that bothered about sex stuff. 

I’m very bothered about this, though. It’s like a dam inside me has burst. 

He’s kicked his joggers off without giving me a chance to see him and I can’t ask yet. The disappointment is swallowed up in a wave of heat that smashes through me when he covers me with his body. 

His cool skin against my burning skin. 

His hard muscles against my squishiness. 

His cock sliding against mine.

I groan at him and he swallows it in a kiss that turns into a groan of his own when I take his cock in my hand. It’s a bit of a squeeze to get my hand between us but I’m determined. 

It’s un-fucking-believable. It feels like mine but not at all. It's maybe a bit longer and softer and _oh Merlin_ I’m touching him. 

It’s all moaning and writhing now. Both of us are so far gone. I’m greedy for more though, and I guess he is too because he’s kissing down my neck and across my chest. He’s got a destination in mind and I am so good with that. 

More than good with it. 

**Baz**

I can’t believe the little gremlin got so bloody handsy after all this time. 

It is so typically Simon though. He doesn’t get over things or work up to them. He just smashes straight though. 

Yesterday it was borderline breakdown if I kissed him first, but today he is asking for blow jobs and touching my cock. 

I have zero complaints. 

I would let him carry on but I’m committed to giving him what he asked for. I kiss down his neck and across his chest taking a deep breath before I run my tongue around his nipple. He gets his hand out from between us so fast and grabs my hair, arching up into me. 

I suck hard and take his nipple in my mouth, flicking it with the tip of my tongue. I’m hypnotised by the way it changes in my mouth, the goosebumps rising on his skin, the way he’s leaking precome over my stomach just from this, because of me. 

I could stay here all day except it's getting too hard to ignore my own erection and the way he’s moving. 

There will be time. 

Surely there will be a next time.

He whines at me when I move but it changes to a gasp when I lick into his navel. It tastes of sweat and precome and Simon. 

It sets another hundred little fires inside of me.

I lick down to the crease of his thigh, swirling my tongue in the blond hairs, pulling his skin into my mouth. I haven’t asked and I know I should really but he’s right here, legs falling open for me. Hands in my hair urging me on. I slide my hands under his arse and tilt him up. He moans deeper as I lick a firm stripe over his hole and nudges into my mouth. I take it as enthusiastic permission to carry on.

I lick and suck and just fucking revel in the taste of him, the way he’s responding, the way he’s opening up to me. 

My own name interspersed with some highly questionable language is ringing in my ears.

He’s nearly suffocating me as he pulls me closer by the hair and thrusts into me with his arse. 

It’s debauched and beautiful. 

“Baz, please, let me come, please?” He’s desperate and breathy. It’s all just so _intoxicating_.

The hammering in my chest at this request makes me wonder if there might be potential here. 

I almost moan at the thought.

Simon Snow asking me for permission is just too much, too good.

I give him one last lick before laying him back down and taking his cock in my hand and mouth. 

“Fucking fuck Baz, fuck.” It’s not eloquent but it is effective. 

I let him guide my pace because I have no idea what I’m doing (it’s all been successful so far though). I hollow my cheeks and suck him as deep as I can without choking. Only moving up and down to his direction. 

I don’t know if he even knows what he wants but between us it’s working. His grip on my hair tightens and his thighs tense at the same time. 

The filthy sounds rumbling out of his mouth would be enough to kill a mortal. My mouth floods with warmth and I keep swallowing and sucking until he tugs at me to stop. I don’t really want to so I grumble briefly before he flips me over onto my back, growling like something wild. 

**Simon**

I need.

I haven’t finished until he has.

I want.

All those things he did to me, will he let me do them to him? Can he wait that long? Can I? 

I know the answer though. I actually can’t. I need his cock in my mouth right now and then we can spend the rest of the day doing the other stuff. I want him to do all that other stuff again. I think I might want him to use his fingers on me. I’m pretty sure I want him to fuck me. Why does it take me so long to get to the thing I want? 

I shake my head a bit and laugh before I kiss his perfect flat stomach (fit twat) it’s not enough though. 

I wrap my mouth around the head of his cock and lick the slit. 

It tastes amazing, he smells amazing. 

I didn’t know that it was possible to get so turned on by sweat and spunk but here we are. 

I grip the base of his cock gently and try to move my mouth and hand at the same time. It works some of the time. He’s cradling the back of my head so gently, encouraging me, trying not to scare me, I guess, but it’s not working. I pull off and look at him over the top of his cock.

“Will you just fuck my face please?” I’m grinning as I say it and he barks a laugh at me before shaking his head like he can’t believe what a nightmare he’s saddled himself with. 

When I take him back in my mouth he gives a hesitant thrust up then grabs my curls and just loses it. I'm drooling everywhere, trying to keep my lips tight around him as he hits the back of my throat over and over again. I don’t gag so I guess that’s a nice skill I didn’t know I had. It’s bloody useful given what I’ve just asked for. 

He’s not as loud as me but his breathing is getting sharp and tense so I’m not surprised when he shudders into my mouth. It’s so fucking lovely. Hearing him fall apart, tasting him as he gives it up to me. 

I crawl back up his body and tuck myself under his arm. He takes my hand and twines his fingers in mine. 

“Can we do that again in a bit please?” I ask, and I find I’m a bit embarrassed but not enough to stop me asking. 

Because I really want to. 

“I think I can find time in my hectic schedule if we must.” He’s trying to be a twat but he’s also kissing my curls so it undermines the twatishness a lot.

“I love you, you know that right? I’m glad you waited for me.” It all spills out all of a sudden and I can’t stop it. 

“Hey, Snow, I love you too you fool, that’s why I waited. I would have waited forever, I’ll wait forever again if you need to stop. I love you.” 

He’s looking at me like I’m worth something, like it could be true. 

My heart clenches. 

Then I feel the magic. It’s not mine and it’s not his and I can’t feel magic anymore anyway. But it’s there. I’m feeling it. Creeping up my arm. Creeping around my hand and his, binding us tight. 

“What is that?” I ask him, because I clearly missed this class or didn’t get told this ancient virginity rite or something.

“It pains me to say that I’m not entirely sure. I’ll find out when I can see a way clear to letting you out of my arms again. That isn’t likely to be any time soon.” He rolls over slightly so he can drape his leg over me. 

I kiss his jaw. 

We watch the tiny flowers light up and then blink out. It’s lovely. It really is. 

I breathe into his neck and drop a kiss on his collarbone. 

He pulls me closer. 


	6. December 20th 2027, 10pm, Salisbury Apartment, 16 Rue De Picot, 16th arr, Paris

**Baz**

I’m pretending to read while he lays in my lap pretending to watch TV. What’s really happening is that I’m stroking his hair and enjoying the warmth of him. 

He’s got his eyes closed and is making little hums of pleasure when I get it just right.

I want to do this forever and I’m just getting used to the idea that I can. 

He’s mine. 

I look at my hand and smile like a fool at the Salisbury signet ring on my finger. It’s the same blue as his eyes. 

I get more ridiculous by the day. 

Possibly by the hour. 

Being in love with Simon Salisbury-Pitch is negatively affecting my IQ.

“I want a baby,” he says. I’m not quite sure I’m hearing correctly. So I put my book down before I ask, “What?”

“A baby, with you.”

“Bend over then, love.” I’m laughing as I say it and he wrestles me onto the floor with him.

“I don’t think it works like that Basil, but I’m willing to give it a go.”

“I bet you are you little minx, bedroom or floor?”

“Oh God, bedroom please, I’m still bruised from last time on the floor.”

I stand up and throw him over my shoulder. 

Literally the only advantage I’ve ever found to being a vampire is the ability to manhandle Simon. 

“It’s a good job I love you, Pitch.”

“That’s Salisbury-Pitch to you, darling.”

He slaps my arse and we laugh like idiots.

**Simon**

I was trying to have a serious conversation but this is good too. It’s not like I need an answer tonight. He chucks me down onto the bed and laughs when I pull him down after me. 

I love his laugh. I never heard it at Watford. Well, never around me. I didn’t hear it much after, a bit in America. So hearing him laugh every day, well it’s magic innit?

Almost as magic as the way he’s kissing me now. 

Gentle and everywhere all at once. 

I try to catch his mouth with mine but he doesn’t stay long. My neck, my collarbone, the edge of my mouth, I’m melting under him. 

"It’s a disgrace, Simon," he says as he slides his tongue into my ear.

"What is, love?" My voice has gone all squeaky and I don’t really want to chat, I want to be eaten alive. 

"How much I love you."

"Fucking hell Baz, you can’t just say that while you’re doing that. I’ll die.”

I will. All the feelings won’t fit inside me. I can’t take my husband telling me he loves me while I’m wrapped around him. 

"How’s about when I’m doing this?"

"Try and see."

"I love you, Simon Salisbury-Pitch," he says as he lazily runs his finger down my spine and under my pyjama bottoms.

"I’m dead, keep going."

"Kinky, but anything for you my love."

He whispers he loves me, he whispers my name, he whispers I’m his as he runs his hands under my clothes and over my skin. 

I really might die of this. 

**Baz**

He is quite something tonight, all soft and stupid. He sighs into every touch, getting more pliant and blissed out under my hands. I’m not used to encountering no resistance at all, he’s always a scrappy little demon even when he’s pretending not to be. But not tonight. Tonight he’s just giving in to me, moving wherever I want him, offering no hindrance to my greedy hands. 

"I like you like this, serene and obedient.”

"If you like it so much why am I still dressed?"

"Because I’m taking my time. If you intend to fill our house with tiny humans who will never allow us a moment to fuck then I’m going to enjoy this while I can.”

The look on his face is everything. I know how much he wants a family. I’ve seen him looking at babies with gooey eyes for months. He’s always been good with children, so kind and patient and gentle. 

I want this for us too.

I want him to have whatever he wants.

I want us to have a family.

The thought of _family._ Our _family._ Well it makes me sigh.

He kisses me stupid and I let him for a while. When he starts moaning, I break away and roll him onto his front. He just lets me. Back to passive and willing, it’s glorious.

I briefly curse myself for not letting him rip off all of our clothes but then I see the possibilities literally laid out in front of me.

I straddle his thighs and ignore his hips bucking up into mine (who am I kidding, I just pretend I’m ignoring it). I give him my most severe look which quiets him down a bit, for now anyway.

**Simon**

He’s going to make me suffer in the best way. I relax into the bed and him and try not to implode from the rightness of it. 

I expect to be dragged out of my clothes finally but instead he inches my t-shirt up by the smallest amount and gently runs his finger across the strip of naked skin between the waistband and the fabric of my shirt. I melt even further when he follows his finger with his mouth. He’s kissing and licking all the way along while he holds me completely still with his weight on my arse and his hands on my hips. I think he’s still expecting a fight from me but tonight I just want to lose myself in him completely. I sigh. 

"Simon, love, may I?" He is giving me the full breathy consent treatment like the plotting twat he is. He’s trying to rile me up. Well, two can play at that. 

"You may sweetheart, I’m yours, completely yours." I’m whispering so he has to lean closer to me to hear. 

The cool of his skin on mine is blissful but not nearly as blissful as the full out groan he gives at my unusually soft response. 

He pushes my t-shirt up another tiny bit and resumes his assault on my back. His mouth is warming up on my skin bit by bit. It’s fucking lush. 

I hum into the pillow quietly but I think he can feel the vibration of it because he moves further up.

I know he’s licking between my moles, joining them up and mapping them, mapping me, learning me, knowing me. 

I’m so giddy on his love and attention today. I don’t think I could properly move if he needed me to. I can just manage to turn my head a bit to try and catch his eye. But he’s busy and the angle is all wrong. 

He gives me a sharp pinch at the top of my hip bone which I assume means I need to stay properly still. He’s not though. He’s grinding onto my arse while he moans into my skin. No respect for the rules at all. 

It’s not so hard to stay still while he’s doing that though. I want to just feel the way he touches me, the way he wants me. He creeps my top up a bit further and sucks at one of my scars. I feel myself growling deep in my throat, more of a purr really, because honestly, I mean, what did I ever do to deserve this? 

There’s a world of licking and sucking with the odd nip here and there and then all of a sudden he seems to lose his cool. 

The ripping sound echoing through our bedroom is not new.

Baz being the one responsible for it, that’s new. 

He shifts off my hips and my pyjama bottoms get the same treatment. I’m fairly sure that it’s not any more effective to take them off like that (I’ve never resorted to ripping trousers) but it is fucking hot. 

He slides off the bed and steps into my eye-line to take his own clothes off. There’s no ripping this time. It’s achingly slow. And so beautiful. He is so beautiful. I press my tongue against my teeth to stop myself begging. He catches the slight movement and raises his eyebrow at me before climbing back onto the bed. 

**Baz**

I don’t know how I’m holding it together. Well I’m obviously not holding it together, I just tore his clothes off. 

Like a heathen. 

Well, more like Simon really. 

Not this Simon though. This Simon is a delight.

Waiting patiently for me. It must be fucking killing him. 

He’s been new tonight. Every time he’s a surprise and I am such a fool for it. 

I nudge his knee and he opens his legs for me. I slide a hand up the inside of his thigh and graze over his arse. He takes a deep breath, still soft and meek. 

I haven’t finished yet though; he can take more, I need more. 

He gives me a pretty little sigh when I lick over his hole, dipping my tongue just inside. I firm my tongue and push in. Usually the monstrous little brat would half suffocate me by grinding on my face but he just takes deep breaths and little sighs. I’m not used to so little feedback but something about the silence is heightening each sensation. It’s focussing me completely on this second, this touch. 

When I move off him to reach for the lube he makes no protest. He doesn’t even move. He doesn’t move when I kiss down his spine. He only makes the slightest little huff when I breach him with a lubed up finger. 

We both laugh at the stupid dopey groan that slips out of me when I work the second finger in. 

The sweat is beading on his shoulders now and every breath is a gasp. I’m working my fingers relentlessly inside him and watching the involuntary tension in his muscles ebb and flow. 

As much as I’m enjoying the sight and sound and sense of Simon falling apart, I’ve got to move on. If I don’t get inside him I’m going to come all over his exquisite arse. 

He dissolves completely when I push into the unbelievable warmth of him. 

“Simon, fuck, Simon.”

I lean over him as I rock my hips into him, closer and closer, deeper and deeper. 

I sink my fingers into his willing mouth and his tongue against my skin sets me on fire. The swirling warmth around me and against me.

His heartbeat on my chest.

I lose any control I might have had left. 

Before I know what I’m doing I push and my magic just flows out of me, straight into Simon. 

I’ve not done this before; he goes first, my magic chases his, _we_ do this. 

But tonight he’s mine and I want to touch him everywhere, I want to make his body sing with my touch and my magic, I want to drive him wild inside and out.

My magic moves through him leaving a glow under his skin. I focus in and find the spots inside that make him gasp. 

My magic lights up his nerves and sends shivers through his body. 

He’s breathing hard, jagged, sharp inhalation followed by staccato exhalations as I get it just right. 

Simon’s orgasms are a thing of beauty on a normal day. They are modern wonders of the world. He explodes into them with such abandon and joy that it’s enough to send anyone insane just watching him. 

I have no idea how that's going to work while he’s like this. I have no idea how he’s held himself still and quiet for this long anyway. 

The only clues that he’s losing his fucking mind are his trembling muscles and the almost inaudible babble slipping from his mouth around my fingers. I kiss his neck, bite at his neck really but stop short of drawing blood. I want to, I want to drink him dry but I’m in no state to control myself if I start. I’m already relentlessly pounding into him and pushing at him with my magic.

I don’t think I could take anything else even though I know he’d gladly give it. 

“I love you darling.” I’m the one growling out endearments for a change. “Come for me please.”

Like he was waiting for permission he gives in completely, comes unravelled, falls apart. 

He tenses around me as his magic slams into mine and I gladly follow him, coming hard and hot and whiting out as my brain just stops. 

**Simon**

I am dead. I was just messing when I said it before but this time it might be true. 

Every single muscle in my body aches with magic and bliss. That was fucking wild. I want to do it again as soon as I can move. Might take a while.

“Baz.”

“Yes, love?”

“That was okay you know. I didn’t hate it.”

He bites me hard on the shoulder and asks, “What lengths would I have to go to to get you to behave for a whole evening?”

I laugh a bit then respond, “Not sure, try that again and see if it works.”

I can feel him laughing as he slips out of me and rolls me over. He takes my face in his (really sticky) hands and snarls at me, “Simon Salisbury Pitch, give me one good reason why I should not just keep finger fucking your impertinent mouth so I don’t have to listen to this drivel.”

I kiss him because that’s honestly the only reason I think is valid. He sighs into my mouth and pulls me closer so I think he agrees. 

We wake up much, much later and so much more sticky than I like. But I don’t want to move though. I want him under me and wrapped in me. He grunts and tries to roll me off but I snuggle closer in grumbling at him until he relaxes in my hold.

“Simon, you are disgusting and sweaty. Please let me clean you up?”

I grin into his neck. “You aren’t much better yourself Pitch, but I clearly love you more because I don’t mind it.” 

“How is this a contest and how are you winning?” He snarls at me and then catches my bottom lip between his teeth briefly and gives me a look of absolute molten lust.

“I’m just that good Pitch, and you want all of it.”

I’m giggling at him but also grinding on him a little tiny bit because, why not?

“It’s Salisbury-Pitch to you, darling. But I’m hungry, so move.”

I hold my wrist up to him. He looks uncertain, then certain, then soft. 

He takes my hand in his, twining his fingers in mine. With his other hand he raises my wrist to his mouth and bites down hard. 

There’s a moment where it hurts so deeply I could cry, but then everything feels good. I love him. I love giving to him, giving everything to him. He looks so hazy and fuck drunk that I feel my heart swelling with each beat. 

“I love you, Baz, I love you.”

When he starts squeezing too hard on my other hand I give him a little nudge with my hip. Just as he pulls off my wrist, the holes closing over as he withdraws.

We both turn to look at our hands at the same time. I can’t quite make out what I’m seeing.

“Calm your magic please Simon, that’s a bit much.”

“Sweetheart that is not me, feel it, it doesn’t feel like mine,” I say with a tiny bit of panic. 

The vines are wrapped around both our hands, hard enough to be uncomfortable. It’s beautiful, there are tiny glowing flowers all over. It does look like my magic but it feels much deeper. 

I look back to Baz but instead of the surprise (Shock? Wonder?) That I expect to find I see tears. Lots of tears. 

“Hey, love, what is it?” I’m panicking again but he smooths my curls with his unbound hand and pulls me into a kiss.

When he lets me up for air the vines have gone but the marks of them are still there. 

“Simon, do you know what this means my love?”

“I don’t sweetheart, but why don’t you kiss me more and then tell me?”

He does.


	7. December 20th 2018, 10pm - Crucible Flower Shop, Moat Terrace, Watford.

**Baz**

I’m right at the edge of everything. He is looking at me like he could find the world in my eyes if he looks hard enough. 

I moan his name over and over like a prayer. He kisses my neck, my jaw, my cheek. 

He’s hardly moving inside me and it’s all I need. 

I don’t want this moment to end. 

I don’t want the real world to come rushing back in. 

Under him, in his arms, I feel like it’s all falling into place. Like I’ve fallen into place. 

Before I think it through and fuck it up I grab his hand and tangle my fingers in it. “I love you.”

He stops kissing me and holds my gaze again. “What?"

Oh fuck. I thought… shit. I assumed that he felt the same or at least similar. I know I would be blushing if I could. I know I’d be crying if I wasn’t so shocked. That irresistible urge to piss him off rises up in me again and I stare him down. “I said I love you.” I try to sneer it in as much as one can sneer that particular sentiment. 

His face lights up like sunrise. “Fuck, Baz, I love you too.”

I feel it then. Magic. More magic than I’ve ever felt that didn’t belong to me. It’s running across his skin in rivulets, making its way to where our hands are joined. Mine rises up to join it, rushing through me, desperate and needy.

Simon brings our hands up until they rest on the pillow and we both watch like slack-jawed idiots as a vine begins to twist around our wrists and hands. It’s covered with tiny blue and yellow flowers. It’s tight but no tighter than I was holding him anyway. It feels right and stupid and funny and gorgeous and perfect. I almost sigh as each little flower blooms and opens.

“Simon?” I can’t help but ask, I’ve not seen enough magic to know if this is just what happens when you have sex.

“It’s not me. Or at least not just me, I can’t just do that.”

He shifts slightly and the movement inside me makes us both gasp.

As magic as the magic is, there are more pressing concerns right now.

He touches his lips to mine so lightly and I nod. 

He speeds up the motion of his hips and the tide inside me starts rushing in. 

I’m going to die kissing this boy.

**Simon**

I’ve had dreams that were a bit like this. Magic and sex and stuff. I’ve had fantasies about sharing magic and sharing space like this. I wished I could fall in love, just see someone and know that they were for me. 

This is all of that and more. 

I can taste our magicks combining. He feels like everything I’ve ever needed and I’m just giddy about whatever nonsense is going on with our hands. I swear if he moans like that one more time I’m going to come. I might anyway. I want to hold on but it’s so good. 

I reach between us and stroke his cock because why the fuck not? And that’s it, for both of us. We moan each other’s names as we come and it blurs into one unholy noise that’s full of soft and hard, love and lust. 

I collapse onto his chest and feel his kisses in my hair. It’s warm and tender and all of a sudden too much. 

“Don’t leave please, stay with me.” I hear my own voice and it’s full of tears I didn’t know were threatening.

“I’m not going anywhere you atrocious muppet. You are forever stuck with me now.” He holds up our hands, still bound with flowers. As he does they start to fade. Like the lights are going out inside them. All that’s left is the marks of them on our skin. 

I run a thumb over his wrist experimentally and it doesn’t come off. He rubs at mine but it’s tattooed, or as good as. 

“Looks like I’ve branded you, sorry,” I say laughing.

“I can see no problem with that, my love. Although I don’t need the reminder. I’m yours. I love you.” He pulls me up into another kiss, gentle and sweet. 

He startles when I push up quickly.

“Fuck Simon, go easy.”

“Sorry, sorry love, it’s just, I think I know what this is.”

**Baz**

I grossly exaggerate my wince as he pulls out because I don’t want him to. I love a magickal mystery as much as the next mage, but I love his weight and warmth on me much, much more.

I wish he was still tied to me. 

I realise I’m unconsciously tracing the marks on my arm with my fingertips. 

He’s ferreting around in a pile of books with his freckled arse on full show for me. It’s like a very hyper-specific porn scene made to suit just me.

It’s making me very very ready to do that all over again. 

“Here, look, it’s a marriage rite.” The blush spreading across his face is breathtaking. 

“Tell me and then come back here and show me again." He laughs as I say it then licks his lips in a truly luscious way.

But then he blushes a little, fidgets a little. He looks uncertain and certain and confused and delighted.

“We’ve bound ourselves together across five dimensions. Look." 

He hands me the book and it does seem terribly familiar. I feel like I’ve heard this before. He carries on undaunted (so undaunted). 

"Normally it’s just symbolic. Different spells, folds between realms, tricky but not impossible. And it’s nice innit, joined in as many ways as you can be? Poetic. Anyway, if the same thing is happening, if each version of us is in love, across all the dimensions at the same time then you get this. The real thing. The ritual is just a copy of it. You end up actually bound. In each dimension.” He grins at me, half sheepishly and half proud.

I reach out for him; I think I’ll always be reaching for him now. 

“Excellent. I heartily approve and I wish all the other versions of us best wishes. Now come back here please or I’ll have to consider more permanent ways of keeping you close.”

He laughs again as he dives into my arms, kissing me messily. 

This world might not be perfect and we might have some serious work to do but we are together. 

Bound together. 

It seems impossibly possible that the man I’m holding onto for dear life loves me enough to fuck up the barriers between realms. It seems impossibly possible that I love him enough to tear a hole in space and time. So here we are. Impossible possible.

And somewhere else, in another universe, another me is sighing the same way as he kisses me. 


End file.
